A Reason to Live
by artsybeanpole
Summary: Seto and Kano's first meeting, and Kano questions why they should keep living in this kind of world. Has young Seto's feminine shoulders and really angsty Kano idk RNR encouraged if you're a cool guy


"What are you doing?"

Kano glanced up, rubbing his swollen lip, blood running down his chin, a hardened look in his eyes. "Fighting." The boy inside of the trashcan crept down a little lower, the intensity of the blond boy's gaze making him want to hide more.

Kano kicked the lifeless adult, the sound of their body hitting the blood or the rain, neither was sure, or cared to find out. He coldly dug the toe of his boot into the side, and his eyes darted back up to the kid in the trash can. "You?"

He flinched, and ashamedly hid his eyes behind the metal. "H-hiding." Kano took a step closer, and there was a rattling sound as the boy seemed to attempt to escape.

He stopped, and spat out a fleck of blood in his mouth, grinning a humorless smile. "Nice thanks _I_ get. It's fine. Go ahead." His boots had barely taken a step until he felt a small hand tug at the end of his jacket.

"N-no, that's not..." The boy coughed out a spray of blood onto the asphalt, and meekly wiped his chin with his sleeve. "I wasn't just going to leave after you saved me, I-"

His head dipped again as he threw up a bucket of blood onto the pavement, his hand shakily trying to hold onto the edge of Kano's sweater, as if he would leave if he let go. Kano heaved up the boy, slinging his arm around his shoulder, his eyes softening a little from their solid black a bit, in a way that was almost gentle. "Hey, jeez, I get it already. Just stop talking, I'll treat your wounds."

He seemed to barely manage a nod, his own purple polo barely hanging onto his feminine shoulders.

...

"Here," Kano wrapped up the boy's stomach underneath his "home," a small camp in an alley on the streets. The kid seemed barely alive, the only sign of him alive the ragged, cold breath that fanned onto his hands as he worked.

His patient's wounds seemed to never end, some wounds, he found, not quite as fresh, but leaving stripes and scars all over his body. "Where'd you get these from?" Kano breathed, tracing a particularly long one down his back. He only shuddered, making a strangled sound as he tried to speak. "I...river..."

Kano snorted, giving him an amused smile they couldn't see from behind. "The river? Is that a gang name?" A slight shake of raven locks said a vague 'no,' and the boy spluttered out, a little more coherently, "Bul...lies."

Kano's eyes hardened again-a solid, dark pupil. "Bullies, huh..." His hands unknowingly gripped the gauze a bit tighter, squeezing the frail boy's stomach, tighter and tighter, stopping only when the kid spasmed and started becoming a blood sprinkler. "Ah, sorry." The blond lessened his hold, and finished wrapping it up properly, smiling triamphauntly. "Alright, all done!"

"Where's your...hou...se?"

Kano froze in his pose. "Hm?" The raven head shuddered, and sat up slowly, clutching his stomach, his eyes oddly bright in the darkness of the tent. The boy tilted his head, like a light, the startling glow of the whites of his eyes gone as he blinked, then cleared, focusing on Kano.

Kano suddenly felt like every part of his body was being exposed, every detail, as the boy's deep brown stared into his. He felt like he was under a surgeon, cold eyes examining, poking at his organs, turning it over, saying, "This is no good either." He blinked again, leaving him in momentary darkness, the brightness of his eyes drawing Kano's pupils into them, whispering, the tent around him suddenly feeling like a weak barrier, easily broken by the startling shock of his inquisitive eyes. "Your parents?"

Kano snapped his eyes away, his heart pounding, and said, in a voice wavering more than he would have liked, "I...I ran away." He cleared his throat, furious at himself for showing such weakness, and what's more, revealing himself so willingly just because of a stare. He quickly plastered a curious smile on his face, as if unfazed, and beamed at the boy, though his instincts screamed for him to look away from the white orbs. "How about you? Are you being a bad boy, running away from your parents?"

The other boy blinked slowly, looking down. "Ye...s." A look of such shame and regret washed over his face that Kano immediately regretted the fact that he had asked. He felt a somewhat bitter pang inside his gut, and spat, with a little more resentment than he had planned to let out, "Well, then the bad boy should hurry on home, because mama and papa are probably reaaally worried about you."

The boy looked up, and the smile slipped off his face for just a second, and the unnerving gaze was back. He chuckled nervously, "Uh, you should stop doing that's freaking me out a little-" The boy's eyes widened, and he quickly ducked down his head. "Oh. Sorry." He sounded ashamed, and maybe a bit regretful, and Kano hated him for it, because now he felt the same. The boy's pale hand tentatively touched the side of his eye worriedly, as if getting too close to it would burn him.

"Did it..." the fingers wavered a little, but returned to his forehead in resolve, "...did it make you uncomfortable?" Kano had to jerk himself back into character, and smiled as if just mocking a good friend-he had made too many mistakes already- he was determined to make the boy smile. "No, of course not-"

There was a rustle and the eyes were back on him, and everything seemed to dissolve, his defenses and lies and laughter falling apart under a simple gaze of a boy. He faltered, and the dejected look that it gave was enough to make Kano curse his people reading skills. His dark locks shifted as he looked down again, a jagged silence in the air.

"No, it's fine." The exact same bitterness in his chopped words was now enmating from the boy as the time he had when he thought he was trying to leave when he stepped forward. Kano winced, the edge in his voice stinging his skin.

To be honest, Kano felt unsure of how he could fix this situation-his confidence was actually wavering. He had even somehow admitted he had ran away, admitted that he, too, was just a boy, a bad kid who had run away from his parents. A bitter smile curled the edges of his lips. 'Bad child'- it was just a normal name to him now. A voice interrupted his thoughts, softer, and meek as the boy's figure. "Sorry, I didn't mean to sound so resentful. I just- well, I'm used to it."

He sounded so _sad,_ so regretful of his existence, saying, "Sorry, sorry," and apologizing over and over again for just being who he was made Kano forget to smile and read the situation carefully, and he burst out angrily, "Stop it!"

The boy looked up, his white eyes shocked, but Kano was hardly cared, he didn't have anything to hide now, anyways. At least now, he was looking into his eyes, instead of looking down at his feet as if he was as low as them. Looking at that stunned face at his words only made him angrier, the other boy's lips starting to move to apologize and form words again, but again Kano glared, slapping a hand over the boy's mouth, "Stop apologizing! It's annoying!"

His red eyes were still a bit shocked, but they immediately looked down again, stuttering, "S-sorry-" Kano threw his hands in the air, his eyes, though he didn't know it, no longer red, his irritation showing through clearly. "You're doing it again! You don't need to apologize! Do you apologize for just talking?"

The boy seemed to flinch, his hands barely raising up to his torn purple polo. "M-mayb..." Another glare from Kano made him flinch again, his hands curling into fists at his shorts, as if he didn't Kano would tear them off in their tracks. "Y-No." Kano gave him a skeptical stare down, the opposite boy's head down, shaking and sweating under his gaze. He sighed, trying to lessen his glare, loosening his back, leaning against the stretching wall of the tent. He could hardly believe he was intimidated by this boy in the first place- he was just an apologizing wimp.

Kano didn't seem to realize that he had said that last part out loud, because the boy's fists tightened around the ripped cloth and muttered, quietly, to his hands, "That's what they said, too." Kano stiffened, trying to remember if he said it out loud, but he was very sure that he didn't- unless he could read minds. He could hear the shifting of tattered clothes as the boy looked up, red eyes dark and unreadable, though he could easily read a tint of bitterness in his words. "That's what they _thought,_ too."

Kano could feel his body trembling again, and firmly gripped at his hands to make them stop shaking, and raised his head, preparing for a dark, angry gaze, but all that was there was more of that dark, swirling self-hatred, his fist tightening around torn pants. "If I could, I'd-"

Kano saw an opportunity, and, though he was a little scared of what would happen next, his eyes flashed red, and he plastered on the most cocky, over-confident smile, as if it was only natural that he was more superior, and flicked the boy's nose, his stunned eyes briefly flashing back to bright red, and Kano grinned, chuckling. "What'll you do?" The boy's eyes looked terrified, and Kano's adrenaline rushed, getting more into character. He pushed him into the small shelf he kept on the wall, broken glass and various tools tumbling to the ground and shattering, splitting his wounds open again into a flooding red, darkening his eyes. He coughed out blood, holding his eye, wiping away a bit of blood on his cheek. "I-"

Kano ignored him, swinging his arm on another shelf, glass and little trinkets clattering and crashing to the ground, broken glass raining around his wrapped up wounds, embedding into his ankles and arms and face. Kano smiled, a nasty curl of his lips, his eyes narrowing, his voice dropping a pitch. "Hey, what'll you do? Are you just going to live like this your whole life?" He picked up a rock, throwing it as the boy meekly tried to defend himself with his cut up arms, another already firmly grabbed in the other. "Pathetic-" he launched one at his chest-"apologizing-" the next hit his ribs, the red blooming as it landed with a sickening 'crack'-" _mess?"_

The last one his arms, and, as Kano tossed another into the air, ready to throw, the bruised arms lowered themselves, his torn, tugged-at hair swept over blood red, stormy eyes filled with murder. 'Aha,' Kano thought, smiling internally, a wide, satisfied grin curling his lips externally, catching the rock in his hand, twisting his arm back slowly enough to push the other to the edge, tilting his head mockingly. "I guess there really is no hope for a sad, hopeless, unloved-"

Before he could finish, a pair of hands leapt for his neck, and Kano felt a short burst of panic- he had reacted a little more violently than he had expected him to, but at least it had worked. He choked as the hands tightened, a murderous glint in the stunningly bright red in the darkness of his makeshift home. He could feel the air depleting in his lungs, and chuckled a little, wheezing out, as his hands squeezed tighter, "Hey, you didn't apologize this time."

A momentary look of shock flashed onto the boy's face, and the grip on his neck loosened, his hands quickly withdrawing back to his chest, a shocked, terrified look quickly spreading across his face as he scrambled to the corner of the tent. Kano coughed, his hand moving to the red grooves in his neck, pushing himself into a sitting position, giving a glance to the shaking boy staring, horrified at his fingers, as if they had committed a great crime (which they probably would have if Kano hadn't said those words). Kano laughed a little, crossing his legs, grinning at him. "You didn't apologize this time."

He buried his face into his hands, whispering continuously, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry." Kano chuckled a little nervously, raising his eyebrows. "Hey, we just made it to square 2, don't start reverting." Rather than more continuous strings of 'I'm sorry's, there was only a chilling silence, instead of the sheepish acknowledgement expected. He laughed again, a little more nervously, and ventured, " Hey, you-"

"I almost killed you." The words weren't little whispers anymore, nor was it loud. It was simple, and clear, and the words were obvious, but the way he said it, so clearly, emotionlessly, sent a strange chill down Kano's spine. Kano cleared his throat, but his voice wavered anyway- "But-"

"I could've killed them all." He spoke again, the same as before, his fingers motionlessly covering his eyes, so still other than his moving mouth Kano would've thought he was dead. The boy pulled his ripped pants up to his chest, his fingers shifting away from his eyes, revealing a blank slate of red. "I almost did that, once, when Hanako..."

His voice choked a little at the end, and his hands moved away from his face, pulling his bruised, cut legs closer, burying his face into his knees. "I can't...what they did to me...I can't do it back...to think..." Kano stared helplessly at him, his hand half out to comfort him. This wasn't what was supposed to happen. He was supposed to be proud for standing up for himself, not like this. Not degrading himself _more._

Kano withdrew his hand, curling it into a fist at his side, and opened his mouth, hoping to say words that would magically fix the situation he had created. Instead, what came out was, "I was bullied too." The raven locks shifted, red eyes barely peeking up from the edges of his bandaged arms, waiting for him to say more. Kano barely noticed, the words spilling out on they're own.

"By..." he hesitated, not sure if he should keep going, but ventured on in an unstoppable tide of words. "By my mom. She would hit me, cut me, and yell at me, saying, 'Shuuya, you're such a pain, just a burden. You're a useless child, using up my money, my time, my pain, you're the product of that. All you'll end up to be is useless when you grow up, when you talk to people, they'll see how useless you are, too.'" He smiled bitterly, his hand raising to his scarred arm. "She would take a lot of pills, and drank a lot. There were bottles all over the floor, on the table. Papers everywhere." His hands fell, tracing the floor as if he was there now. "She locked me in my room once, for 4 days, when I stole some of her money. 'Bad kids need to be put away.'" Kano's eyes darkened, and he switched to squatting on the asphalt, playing with a shard of glass on the rock, scraping it against the ground, the boy intently watching his face as he continued. "I ran away. Because I'm a bad, unwanted kid, right?"

He laughed a little, tossing the glass towards the boy's feet, his eyes challenging the opposite's red ones. "C'mon, there's no way, right?" He leaned back against the tent, smiling again, his eyes sliding over to the boy tentatively staring at the shard glinting in the slit of light from the opening from their fight. "Adults are so useless. They think you're not something they want or need, or just don't want to know, and they beat you around, convincing themselves they're better by 'ridding the world of filth.'" Kano picked up another particularly large shard, savagely slicing another slit into the tent, peeling back to reveal the dark, damp alley to the crouching boy. "Right?"

The boy looked up, his eyes flashing red, stunned yet determined, the first different emotion other than self-hatred and self-shame he had seen so far. "No! It's not like that at all!"

The intense conviction of his voice threw Kano back, his eyes blinking and returning to red, turning to question the boy staring determinedly at him. He raised his hands, giving him a light laugh, humoring him. "Why? Isn't that what they did to you? They even drowned your precious 'Hanako."

The determination in his eyes faltered, but he balled up his fists and stubbornly retorted, "T...They did, but they...they..." He seemed to falter again, his red eyes turbulent, uncertain. Kano smirked, knowing it would always be like this, and shrugged his shoulders. The faster they realized, the better. "You see? You can try to deny it, but the end, it's the same. Just accept it already."

The boy looked up at him, and there was something so sad, so desperate for him to understand, but he couldn't quite place it. "No, I didn't..." he started miserably, letting out a long sigh. "It's just that, it might be true, but...I thought it was a bit sad."

Kano raised his eyebrows, sitting up a bit. "What do you mean?"

Seto looked at him with an unexplainable, profound sadness and-maybe, he swore- pity in his eyes, the same look his teachers gave him whenever he'd come in late with poorly hidden bruises.

"I thought it was a bit sad... that you've never been able to think in any other way than this your whole life. Every encounter with people, they'd treat you enough that you felt that the only way was to just believe there's no good at all, I... I wish I could show you." The boy ran a hand through his dark locks, a bit frustrated. "I wish... I wanted to explain to you that, hey, maybe there's something to keep living for, and that there's some good in the world, but I can't."

He buried his face in his hands again, and apologized, softly, "I'm sorry."

Kano felt struck for a moment, the soft words reaching out to him. He wasn't apologizing for himself anymore, instead, the words were directed at him, asking, wishing as if it were impossible, as if he were some kind of lost cause.

It made Kano angry.

"Stop apologizing already!" Kano irritatedly grabbed at the boy's hands, pulling them away from his face, and forced him to look at his face. "There's nothing to be sorry about for me! I deserve it! But you, you-"

Kano stared furiously into his eyes, throwing away the startled boy's wrists. "You haven't done a thing, and your apologizing for yourself, and now for me? Are you saying I'm lower than you are in your mind? Why?"

"Why would you still think there's hope for me, for them? Why-" Kano's voice cracked involuntarily, and suddenly the anger melted. His shoulder's slumped, and he fell down on his knees, covering his eyes with his hand, feeling exhausted, and incredibly, strangely, sad.

"Why are you so willing to believe that it could ever change?" He could barely whisper it, the boy staring at him hopelessly, his hands tentatively outstretched. The boy took in a breath, and laid a hand on the other boy's head. "Because I think there's at least one person out there who cares, even a little."

Kano tried to laugh, but it came out bitter, hollow. "And who would that be?"

The boy laughed with him, and he gently moved his hand away, smiling, as meek and small as it may be, and said, "Me."

Kano raised his head just so lightly, and grinned, rubbing his hand over his eyes before flicking the smiling boy's forehead, laughing for real for the first time in years, giving him a teasing smile. "And what makes you think that I'll stay alive for some wimp like _you_?"

The boy seemed momentarily shocked, stuttering for words. "E-Eh? But I thought-" He felt another sting on his forehead, Kano's smile there when he opened his eyes. "Hey, hey, what'd I say about apologizing, huh? Well, let's go."

Kano groaned, and stood up, his knees sore, and held out a hand to the boy, his confused eyes questioning and a little nervous. "H-Huh? Where?"

Kano rolled his eyes, and raised his eyebrows expectantly. "I thought you were going to go show me where all these great things to live for were? Your existence isn't enough to keep me going, I need better reasons."

The boy's eyes lit up, and he nodded eagerly, clasping Kano's hand with more strength than he thought he had. "Right."

Kano pulled open the tent flap, waiting for him to go through, and laid his hands behind his head, looking back. "So where are we going first?"

"Well, actually, there's this forest, and there's this white haired girl who lives there..."

A/N: I kinda felt like I rambled a lot here, but it actually turned out pretty good what with the angsty Kanos and Seto's 'feminine shoulders.' Fetus setokano is best I'll probably do this again someday in the future huehue


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